MICROSOF DISK OPERATING SYSTEM (MS DOS)
HISTORY
MS-DOS
was a renamed form of 86-DOS– owned by Seattle Computer
Products, written
by Tim Paterson. Development of 86-DOS took only
six weeks, as it was basically a clone of Digital Research's CP/M (for 8080/Z80 processors), ported to run on 8086 processors and with two notable
differences compared to CP/M; an improved disk sector buffering logic and the
introduction of FAT12 instead of the CP/M file system. This first version was
shipped in August 1980. Microsoft, which needed an operating system for the IBM Personal
Computerhired Tim
Paterson in May 1981 and bought 86-DOS 1.10 for $75,000 in July of the same
year. Microsoft kept the version number, but renamed it MS-DOS. They also
licensed MS-DOS 1.10/1.14 to IBM, who, in August 1981, offered it as PC DOS 1.0 as one of three operating systems for the IBM 5150, or the IBM PC.
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Within
a year Microsoft licensed MS-DOS to over 70 other companies. It was designed to be an OS that could run on
any 8086-family computer. Each computer would have its own distinct hardware
and its own version of MS-DOS, similar to the situation that existed for CP/M, and with MS-DOS emulating the same solution as CP/M to adapt for different hardware platforms. To this
end, MS-DOS was designed with a modular structure with internal device drivers,
minimally for primary disk drives and the console, integrated with the kernel
and loaded by the boot loader, and installable device drivers for other devices
loaded and integrated at boot time. The OEM would use a development kit
provided by Microsoft to build a version of MS-DOS with their basic I/O drivers
and a standard Microsoft kernel, which they would typically supply on disk to
end users along with the hardware. Thus, there were many different versions of
"MS-DOS" for different hardware, and there is a major distinction
between an IBM-compatible (or ISA) machine and an MS-DOS [compatible] machine.
Some machines, like the Tandy 2000, were MS-DOS compatible but not IBM-compatible, so they
could run software written exclusively for MS-DOS without dependence on the
peripheral hardware of the IBM PC architecture.
This
design would have worked well for compatibility, if application programs had
only used MS-DOS services to perform device I/O, and indeed the same design
philosophy is embodied in Windows NT (see Hardware Abstraction
Layer).
However, in MS-DOS's early days, the greater speed attainable by programs
through direct control of hardware was of particular importance, especially for
games, which often pushed the limits of their contemporary hardware. Very soon
an IBM-compatible architecture became the goal, and before long all 8086-family
computers closely emulated IBM's hardware, and only a single version of
MS-DOS for a fixed hardware platform was needed for the market. This version is
the version of MS-DOS that is discussed here, as the dozens of other OEM
versions of "MS-DOS" were only relevant to the systems theywere
designed for, and in any case were very similar in function and capability to
the same-numbered standard version for the IBM PC, with a few notable
exceptions.
On
25 March 2014, Microsoft made the code to SCP MS-DOS 1.25 and a mixture of Altos MS-DOS 2.11 and TeleVideo PC DOS
2.11 available to the public under the Microsoft Research License Agreement, which makes the code source-available, but not open source as defined by Open Source
Initiative or Free Software
Foundation
standards.
As
an April Fools joke in 2015, Microsoft Mobile launched a Windows Phone application called MS-DOS Mobile which was presented
as a new mobile operating system and worked similar to MS-DOS.
Versions:
Microsoft
licensed or released versions of MS-DOS under different names like Lifeboat Associates "Software Bus 86"aka SB-DOS, COMPAQ-DOS, NCR-DOS or Z-DOS before it eventually enforced the
MS-DOS name for all versions but the IBM one, which was originally called
"IBM Personal Computer DOS", later shortened to IBM PC DOS. (Competitors released compatible DOS systems such as DR DOS and PTS-DOS that could also run DOS applications.)
The
following versions of MS-DOS were released to the public:
·
MS-DOS 1.x
o
Version
1.10 (OEM) – possible basis for IBM's Personal Computer DOS 1.0
o
Version
1.11 (OEM) – possible basis for IBM's Personal Computer DOS 1.0
o
Version
1.14 (OEM) – possible basis for IBM's Personal Computer DOS 1.0
o
Version
1.24 (OEM) – basis for IBM's Personal Computer DOS 1.1
·
Compaq-DOS
1.12, a Compaq OEM version of MS-DOS (1.25 or higher)
- MS-DOS 2.x –
Support for 10 MB hard disk drives and tree-structure filing
system
- Version 2.0 (OEM)
- Version 2.1 (OEM)
- Version 2.11 (OEM)
- Altos MS-DOS 2.11, an Altos OEM version of MS-DOS 2.11 for the ACT-86C
- TeleVideo PC DOS 2.11, an TeleVideo OEM version of MS-DOS 2.11
- MS-DOS 3.x
- Version 3.0 (OEM) – Support for FAT16. First version to support 5.25 inch, 1.2 MB floppy drives and diskettes.
- Version 3.1 (OEM) – Support for Microsoft Networks
- Version 3.11 (OEM) - First version to support 3.5 inch, 720 kB floppy drives and diskettes.
- Version 3.2 (OEM)
- Version 3.21 (OEM)
- Version 3.22 (OEM) - (HP 95LX)
- Version 3.25 (OEM)
- Version 3.3 (OEM) - First version to support 3.5 inch, 1.44 MB floppy drives and diskettes.
- Version 3.3a (OEM)
- Version 3.31 (OEM)– supports FAT16B and larger drives.
- MS-DOS 4.0 (multitasking) and MS-DOS 4.1 –
- A separate branch of development with additional multitasking features, released between 3.2 and 3.3, and later abandoned. It is unrelated to any later versions, including versions 4.00 and 4.01 listed below
- MS-DOS 4.x (IBM-developed) – includes a graphical/mouse interface. It had many bugs and compatibility issues.
- Version 4.00 (OEM) - First version to support a single hard disk partition that is greater than 32 MiB and up to a maximum size of 2 GiB (SHARE.EXE was required to be loaded to access these partitions).
- Version 4.01 (OEM) – Microsoft rewritten Version 4.00 released under MS-DOS label but not IBM PC-DOS. First version to introduce volume serial number when formatting hard disks and floppy disks (Disk duplication also and when using SYS to make a floppy disk or a partition of a hard drive bootable).
- Version 4.01a (OEM)
- MS-DOS 5.x
- Version 5.0 (Retail) – includes a full-screen editor. A number of bugs required re issue. First version to support 3.5 inch, 2.88 MB floppy drives and diskettes. Hard disk partitions greater than 32 MiB and up to a maximum size of 2 GiB no longer required SHARE.EXE to be loaded in order to access them. Support was now provided by the MS-DOS kernel.
- AST Premium Exec DOS 5.0 (OEM) - a version for the AST Premium Exec series of notebooks with various extensions, including improved load-high and extended codepage support
- Version 5.0a (Retail) – With this release, IBM and Microsoft versions diverge.
- Version 5.0.500 (WinNT) – All Windows NT 32-bit versions ship with files from DOS 5.0
- MS-DOS 6.x
- Version 6.0 (Retail) – Online help through QBASIC. Disk compression, upper memory optimization and antivirus included.
- Version 6.2 – Scandisk as replacement for CHKDSK. Fix serious bugs in DBLSPACE.
- Version 6.21 (Retail) – Stacker-infringing DBLSPACE removed.
- Version 6.22 (Retail) – New DRVSPACE compression
- MS-DOS 7.x
- Version 7.0 (Windows 95, Windows 95A) – Support for VFAT long file names and 32-bits signed integer error level. New editor. JO.SYS is an alternative filename of the IO.SYS kernel file and used as such for "special purposes". JO.SYS allows booting from either CD-ROM drive or hard disk. Last version to recognize only the first 8.4 GB of a hard disk.
- Version 7.1 (Windows 95B – Windows 98SE) – Support for FAT32 file system. Last general purpose DOS to load Windows.
- MS-DOS 8.0
- Version 8.0 (Windows ME) – Integrated drivers for faster Windows loading. Four different kernels (IO.SYS) observed.[28]
- Version 8.0 (Windows XP) – DOS boot disks created by XP and later contain files from Windows ME. The internal command prompt still reports version 5.0
Microsoft
DOS: was
released through the OEM channel, until DRI released DR DOS 5.0 as a
retail upgrade. With PC DOS 5.00.1, the IBM-Microsoft agreement started to
end, and IBM entered the retail DOS market with IBM DOS 5.00.1, 5.02, 6.00
and PC DOS 6.1, 6.3, 7, 2000 and 7.1.
Localized
versions of MS-DOS existed for different markets. While Western issues of
MS-DOS evolved around the same set of tools and drivers just with localized
message languages and differing sets of supported codepages and keyboard
layouts, some language versions were considerably different from Western issues
and were adapted to run on localized PC hardware with additional BIOS services
not available in Western PCs, support multiple hardware codepages for displays
and printers, support DBCS, alternative input methods and graphics output.
Affected issues include Japanese (DOS/V), Korean, Arabic (ADOS 3.3/5.0), Hebrew (HDOS
First end-user releases of
IBM–Microsoft-compatible versions
Major market-leading releases and releases introducing significant new technology
Date Version Primary developer Notable for introducing IBM hardware August 1980 86-DOS 0.10 Tim Paterson First Seattle Computer release August 1981 PC DOS 1.0 Microsoft First IBM release IBM Personal Computer May 1982 PC DOS 1.1 Microsoft Double-sided disks Upgraded IBM Personal Computer March 1983 PC DOS 2.0 Microsoft Hard disk drive, directories, device drivers IBM Personal Computer XT November 1983 PC DOS 2.1 Microsoft Half-height disk drives, ROM cartridges IBM PCjr August 1984 PC DOS 3.0 Microsoft Support for larger disks IBM Personal Computer/AT April 1985 PC DOS 3.1 Microsoft Local area networking support IBM PC Network March 1986 PC DOS 3.2 Microsoft 31⁄2-inch 720 KB floppy support Token Ring network
IBM PC Convertible April 1987 PC DOS 3.3 IBM 31⁄2-inch 1.44 MB floppy support, extended partitions IBM Personal System/2 November 1987 MS-DOS 3.31 Compaq Hard disk partitions over 32 MB
Major market-leading releases and releases introducing significant new technology
Date Version Primary developer Notable for introducing IBM hardware August 1980 86-DOS 0.10 Tim Paterson First Seattle Computer release August 1981 PC DOS 1.0 Microsoft First IBM release IBM Personal Computer May 1982 PC DOS 1.1 Microsoft Double-sided disks Upgraded IBM Personal Computer March 1983 PC DOS 2.0 Microsoft Hard disk drive, directories, device drivers IBM Personal Computer XT November 1983 PC DOS 2.1 Microsoft Half-height disk drives, ROM cartridges IBM PCjr August 1984 PC DOS 3.0 Microsoft Support for larger disks IBM Personal Computer/AT April 1985 PC DOS 3.1 Microsoft Local area networking support IBM PC Network March 1986 PC DOS 3.2 Microsoft 31⁄2-inch 720 KB floppy support Token Ring network
IBM PC Convertible April 1987 PC DOS 3.3 IBM 31⁄2-inch 1.44 MB floppy support, extended partitions IBM Personal System/2 November 1987 MS-DOS 3.31 Compaq Hard disk partitions over 32 MB
May 1988
DR DOS
3.31 Digital Research ROM able
DOS July 1988
IBM DOS
4.0 IBM
DOS Shell,
EMS 4.0
usage April 1990
DR DOS
5.0 Digital Research Memory management June 1991
MS-DOS
5.0 Microsoft
MS-DOS Editor, QBasic,
first retail upgrade September 1991
DR DOS
6.0 Digital Research Disk compression
(Add Stor's Super Store) March 1993
MS-DOS
6.0 Microsoft
Disk utilities, DoubleSpace disk compression June 1993
PC DOS
6.1 IBM
First IBM release after split with Microsoft, E
September 1993
MS-DOS
6.2 Microsoft
Improved version of DoubleSpace February 1994
MS-DOS
6.21 Microsoft
DoubleSpace removed due to legal injunction April 1994
PC DOS
6.3 IBM
Superstore/DS disk compression June 1994
MS-DOS
6.22 Microsoft
Last Microsoft release; DriveSpace
disk compression April 1995
PC DOS
7.0 IBM
Memory optimizations, Stacker disk compression, REXX
1973–1980: Hardware foundations and CP/M
- 8-bit CP/M : First licensed release
- 1.3
- 1.4
- 2.0
- 3.0
1973
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IBM introduces the IBM 3740 data entry system,
which introduced a new recording medium—a single-sided 8-inch-diameter
read/write "memory disk"—the IBM diskette, to replace punched
cards.[1] See also: History of the
floppy disk
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IBM
introduces Winchester hard
disk drive
technology with the IBM 3340 direct access
storage device for
use on their System/370 mainframes.[2] See also: History of
hard disk drives
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While
working as a consultant to Intel, Gary
Kildall, an instructor
at the Naval Postgraduate School, writes CP/M, a simple "Control
Program/Monitor" for an 8-bit Intel
8080 microprocessor-based Intellec-8[3][4] microcomputer development system[5] given him by Intel, to test out his PL/M compiler. The Intellec-8 supported a Teletype operating at 110 baud, a high speed punched
paper tape
reader[6] and a CRT terminal at 1200 baud. CP/M was finished before the
hardware to run it on was completed, by using a PDP-10 to simulate the 8080. CP/M runs in approximately 31⁄2 kilobytes (KB) of memory.[7]
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1974
|
Bill
Gates, Paul
Allen and Paul Gilbert
develop the Traf-O-Data Intel
8008-based computer.[8] The 8-bit 8008 has a 14-bit address
bus that can address 214 (16,384) memory locations,
or 16 KB of memory.
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Intel releases the 8080 (cost $360), which
has a 16-bit address bus that can address 216 (65,536) memory
locations, or 64 KB of memory. The dominant mainframe at the time, the IBM
System/360, can
address 224 (16,777,216) memory locations, or 16 megabytes (MB) of memory.
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Information
Terminals Corporation
(ITC) introduces the first two-sided, double-capacity floppy disk—the model
FF34-2000 flippy disk, compatible with IBM's 8-inch disk.[9][10]
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Kildall
refines CP/M. Convinced that magnetic-disk
storage would make the
Intellec-8 more efficient, Kildall interfaced the computer with an 8-inch Shugart Associates floppy
disk drive using a
custom built floppy disk controller. Kildall's friend John Torode developed
the controller hardware while Kildall worked on the disk operating system software.[11] Believing, along with Intel's designers,
that the microprocessor would run embedded
systems such as digital
watches, they market
their hardware and software together—not as a microcomputer, but as a
development system, used for programming 2048-bit (256-byte) Intel 1602A programmable
read-only memory
(PROM) or erasable 1702A EPROM chips which are plugged into a socket on the
Intellec-8's front panel
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1975
|
The Micro
Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS) Altair
8800 is introduced,
sparking the microcomputer revolution. Gates and Allen found Microsoft based on Altair
BASIC, which for the
first 11⁄2 years is primarily
distributed on paper tape. MITS later distributes BASIC on cassette tape, supported by the Altair 88-ACR (Audio
Cassette Recorder) interface boards. Cassettes were popular for another 11⁄2 years, before floppy disks took
over. The
Altair's S-100 bus eventually becomes the first de facto
standard microcomputer expansion
bus, as by April
1980 there were probably over 200,000 installed S-100 systems, more than TRS-80, PET and Apple systems.
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Kildall
and Torode sell their first two machines and a word
processor for
newspaper editing to OMRON, a small San Francisco computer terminal
subsidiary of a Japanese electronics firm, splitting $25,000. OMRON was the
first company to license CP/M, for use in their intelligent terminal. CP/M was also used to monitor programs in
the Lawrence
Livermore National Laboratory Octopus
network.
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The IBM
5100 Portable Computer is introduced. Mass
storage is provided by quarter-inch cartridge (QIC) magnetic
tape drives.
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In
December, IMS Associates, Inc. ships their first fifty IMSAI
8080 kits. They
market their clone of the Altair 8800 as a "commercial
grade" microcomputer system.
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1975
market shares for low-cost data recording devices, according to a Venture
Development Corp. study: Cassettes 73%, Floppies 22%, Cartridges 5%. The
cassette was expected to retain its leadership position through 1980.
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1976
|
IBM
introduces additional hardware components for its 3600 finance communication
system, including the first double-sided (dual head) floppy drive ITC adjusts Floppy (now a
registered trademark) production to accommodate the new drive
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IMSAI ships a large number of disk
subsystems with a promise that an operating system would follow; Kildall
adapts CP/M to the IMSAI hardware, rewriting the parts that manage devices
like diskette controllers and CRTs. Having adapted CP/M for four different
controllers, and somewhat reluctant to adapt it to yet another, Kildall
designs a general interface, which he calls the BIOS (Basic Input/Output System), that a good programmer could change on the spot for their
hardware, e.g. Rob Barnaby for the IMSAI VDP-80 in 1977 This approach would
be reinvented years later as the "hardware abstraction layer." Kildall founds Digital
Research and releases
CP/M version 1.3 as a commercial product, at $70 per copy. His wife sends
diskettes to customers responding to an ad they ran in Dr. Dobb's Journal, whose editor Jim Warren pushed for sale of CP/M to the general
public. An ad runs in the December Byte as well. Demand for the
diskettes was slow at first.
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1977
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IMSAI
marketing director Seymour I. Rubinstein paid Kildall $25,000 for the right to run
CP/M version 1.3, which eventually evolved into an operating system called IMDOS, on IMSAI 8080 computers. Other
manufacturers follow and CP/M eventually becomes the de facto standard
8-bit operating system.
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Tandon
Magnetics
files a patent for its double-sided ferrite disk read-and-write heads, which improved on IBM's design by employing
a fixed transducer on one side and a movable transducer on the other
side, and offered its Series 200 heads to OEMs. Eventually IBM, Shugart and other
manufacturers became licensees of Tandon's patent. Later, Shugart introduces
their double-sided, double-headed, double
density minifloppy
drive.
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1978
|
Intel
releases the 16-bit Intel
8086 microprocessor,
which has a 20-bit address bus that can address 220 (1,048,576)
memory locations, or one megabyte of segmented memory.
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CP/M
version 1.4 is released
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Rubinstein
founds MicroPro International. Its WordStar word processor application would become a de
facto standard.
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1979
|
January
|
Seattle Computer Products' Tim
Paterson finishes the
design of his first 8086 CPU
card for the S-100
bus.
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May
|
Paterson,
with his working two-card prototype boardset installed in a Cromemco
Z-2 box, drives to
Microsoft to try it with Microsoft's Standalone
Disk BASIC-86—a
version of BASIC with a rudimentary built-in operating system—which Bob
O'Rear developed for
the 8086 by simulating the 8086 chip on a DEC computer. After eliminating a few minor
bugs, Microsoft had a working 8086 BASIC.
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Kildall
confirms to The Intelligent
Machines Journal
that he is working on CP/M 2.0, for both 8080- and 8086-based systems.
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June
|
Microsoft and Paterson attend the National
Computer Conference in New York City to show Microsoft's 8086 BASIC running
on Seattle Computer's system, sharing Lifeboat Associates' ten-by-ten-foot booth. At that meeting,
Paterson is introduced to Microsoft's MDOS operating system (later renamed to MIDAS),
which used a variant of Standalone BASIC's 8-bit File Allocation Table (FAT) file
system.
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July
|
Intel releases the Intel
8088 microprocessor,
a lower cost variant of the 8086 which has an 8-bit external data bus instead
of the 16-bit bus of the 8086 (the 16-bit registers and one megabyte address
space were unchanged).
To the programmer, the 8086 and 8088 instruction
sets are identical,
except for execution speed. The 8088 uses less expensive 8-bit RAM.
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November
|
Seattle
Computer Products ships its first 8086 card. Standalone Microsoft BASIC is
the only major software product that runs on it.
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Onyx Systems and Intelligent Business Machines Corp.
announce that CP/M 2.0 is available for their systems.
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1980
|
January
|
Omnix,
advertised as a CP/M-compatible Unix-like operating system for Z80-based microcomputers, is released by Yourdon. It reportedly took over 50 KB of memory
by itself and required some sort of bank-switching or extended address scheme to run any
programs. Yourdon later withdrew the product due to software bugs.
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March
|
CP/M
2.1 is released, fixing bugs in version 2.0. MP/M, the multitasking, multi-user version of CP/M, is just a
"shell" that fits around CP/M 2.1.
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1980–1995: Important events in DOS history
1980
|
April
|
Paterson begins writing an operating
system for use with Seattle Computer Products' 8086-based computer, due to
delays by Digital Research in releasing an operating system for the 8086 and
8088, and concerns about CP/M's shortcomings.
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June
|
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July
|
IBM first contacts Microsoft to look
the company over. Their secret Project Chess needs both programming languages and an
operating system.
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August
|
Paterson's operating system, which he
calls QDOS 0.10 ("Quick and Dirty Operating System"), ships.[]
It's crammed into 6 KB of code.[51]
Seattle Computer Products runs an ad in Byte marketing it as 86-DOS
for $95. Seattle Computer contacts Microsoft about adapting Microsoft BASIC
for the new operating system, proposing a cross-licensing arrangement.
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||
Microsoft announces Xenix,
a port of Version 7 Unix to x86
computers, saying that it will prevent a 16-bit software crisis. Xenix will
also be available for the PDP-11
as early as October; Motorola 68000
and Zilog Z8000 versions are also
coming. Interest in Unix as "the next CP/M" resulted in the
creation of several Unix-like operating systems, including an Onyx Systems
version for the Z8000.
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September
|
Allen negotiates an agreement with
Seattle Computer for a non-exclusive sublicense for 86-DOS to an
unnamed OEM
customer for $25,000. All that was left was to translate the terms into a
formal contract within 60 days.
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October
|
Digital Research announces CP/M-86
for Intel 8086/8088 microcomputers. The file format of CP/M, Release 2, was
retained for compatibility.
|
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November
|
IBM signs a contract to license Pascal,
COBOL,
FORTRAN
and BASIC
compilers, a BASIC interpreter and an operating
system for Project Chess from Microsoft.
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December
|
Seattle Computer releases 86-DOS
0.3.
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1981
|
January
|
Microsoft and Seattle Computer
formally sign their agreement. Exhibit "A" of the agreement
detailed extended 86-DOS features to be developed by Seattle Computer,
including "Directory expanded to include date."
|
|
Digital Research ships CP/M-86 on
January 23. Like CP/M, CP/M-86 consists of three major modules: the BIOS,
BDOS (Basic Disk Operating System) supporting 60 system calls
and the CCP (Console Command Processor). New system calls are mainly for the
new memory allocation scheme that CP/M-86
uses. Intel's PL/M-86 was used to generate CP/M-86, which is basically the
same as the 8-bit version, with the addition of file system enhancements as
well as memory management.
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February
|
O'Rear gets 86-DOS to run on IBM's
prototype computer. 86-DOS had to be converted from 8-inch to 51⁄4-inch floppy disks and integrated
with the BIOS, which Microsoft was helping IBM to write.[11]
An Intellec ICE-88 in-circuit emulator expedited the
debugging.
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April
|
Paterson finishes, and Seattle
Computer releases, 86-DOS 1.0 – presumably completing the requirements
specified in Exhibit "A" of the Microsoft agreement.
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||
May
|
Paterson leaves Seattle Computer
Products for Microsoft and joins O'Rear to help finish adapting 86-DOS to
IBM's prototype hardware.
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June
|
Lifeboat Associates, the leading
independent distributor of CP/M and CP/M software, offers Seattle Computer
Products $200,000 or $250,000
for
86-DOS, to make it Lifeboat's 16-bit standard.
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July
|
Kildall, angry after seeing the API
for IBM's secret computer, that IBM had let selected programmers have, meets
with IBM and agrees not to sue IBM for CP/M copyright infringement; IBM
agrees to market CP/M-86 alongside DOS, but could not agree to set a
price—according to Kildall's attorney, "They told us they feared it
would be a violation of antitrust
laws." Immediately afterwards, IBM sent their prototype machine to
Kildall so that CP/M-86 could be installed. Digital Research hired consultant
An Andy Johnson-Laird to customize
CP/M-86 for IBM's computer, and Johnson-Laird quickly discovered O'Rear's
name in the boot sector of IBM's floppy.
Johnson-Laird said that Kildall "went ashen" when he saw that. On
July 27, Microsoft buys all rights to 86-DOS from Seattle Computer Products,
initially for an additional $50,000 and favorable licenses back from
Microsoft. After settling a 1986 SCP lawsuit,
the total cost to Microsoft was $1 million. 1981 August Microsoft delivers
its adapted 86-DOS 1.14 to IBM. The product includes three major
modules: the BIOS initialization module SYSINIT, the kernel (IBMDOS.COM),
including the DOS API, and the shell (COMMAND.COM)
supporting internal commands COPY,
DIR, ERASE, RENAME and TYPE, plus Paterson's EDLIN
line editor
and DEBUG debugger,
linker LINK.EXE and a few
external commands: FORMAT, CHKDSK,
SYS, BASIC, BASICA,
DATE and TIME
(the latter two added on IBM's request). This product was later called MS-DOS
1.0 by Microsoft. Similar in many ways to CP/M, it consisted of 4000 lines of
assembly language source code and ran
in 8 KB of memory.
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Microsoft Disk
Operating System, MS-DOS is a non-graphical
command line operating system derived from 86-DOS that was created for IBM
compatible computers. MS-DOS originally written by Tim Paterson
and introduced by Microsoft
in August 1981
and was last updated in 1994
when MS-DOS 6.22 was released. MS-DOS allows the user to navigate, open, and
otherwise manipulate files on their computer from a command line instead of a GUI
HOW TO OPEN MS DOS COMMAND PROMPT
STEP
1
To open command prompt, click Start, point to All
Programs, point to Accessories, and then click Command Prompt.
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•
|
To switch between a full screen and a window, press
ALT+ENTER.
|
•
|
To quit a command prompt session, type exit at the
blinking cursor in the command prompt window.
|
STEP 2
Launch The Command Prompt From The Run Window
One of the quickest ways to launch the Command Prompt
is to use the Run window (press Win+R on your keyboard to open it). Then,
type cmd or cmd.exe and press Enter or click/tap OK.
STEP 3
Launch It From The Start Menu/Screen
If you are using Windows 7, open the Start Menu and
go to All Programs -> Accessories. There you will find the Command
Prompt shortcut.
TEXT/BACKGROUND COLORS:
The
standard window displays white text on a black background. This color
combination may make difficult to read. To make the window display black text
on a white background, type the command: color f0 (that’s the letter F followed
by the zero 0). To go back to the standard of white text on a black background,
type: color
COLOR CONSOLE IN MICROSOFT DOS
Console
color current Background = Console Background color
Console
color current foreground = Console Foreground Color;
/Display
all current foreground colors expect the one that matches the background
console. Write line (“All the foreground colors except {0}.” Color);
Console. Write
Line ();
//Restore
the foreground color.
Console.
Foreground Color = current Foreground;
//
Display each background color except the
one that matches the current foreground color.
Console.
Write Line (“ All the background colors except {0}, the foreground color:”,
Current Foreground);
For
each (var color in colors){
If
(color== current Foreground) continue;
Console.
Background Color = color;
Console.
Write Line (“The background color is {0}.” Color);
Restore the original console color.
Console.
Reset Color ();
Console.
Write Line (“\original colors restored…”);
//The
example displays output like the following:
//All
the foreground colors except Dark Cyan, the background color:
//The
foreground color is black
//The
foreground color is Dark Blue
//The
foreground color is Dark Green
//The
foreground color is Dark Red
//The
foreground color is Dark Magenta
//The
foreground color is Dark Yellow
//The
foreground color is Gray
//The
foreground color is Dark Gray
//The foreground color is Blue
//The
foreground color is Green
//The
foreground color is Cyan
//The
foreground color is Red
//The
foreground color is Magenta
//The
foreground color is Yellow
//The
foreground color is White
//All
the background color except White, the foreground color:
//
The background color is Black
//The
background color s Dark Blue
//The
background color is Dark Green
//The
background color is Dark Cyan
//The
background color is Dark Red
//The
background color is Dark Magenta
//The
background color is Dark Yellow
//The
background color is Gray
//The
background color is Dark Gray
//The
background color is Blue
//The
background color is Green
//The
background color is Cyan
//The
background color is Red
//The
background color is Magenta
//The
background color is Yellow
//Original
colors restored…
Console colors. On a console, text and background
colors can be changed. This sometimes makes programs easier to use. We change
colors to make programs more expensive. Errors and alerts are more noticeable.
This leads to higher quality.
Example.
First, the console has many static methods and properties on it. To see them,
type “Console” and press the period.
Intellisense will show you the possible methods. Here we see background color
and foreground color
Black
Dark Blue
Dark Green
Dark Cyan
Dark Red
Dark Magenta
Dark Yellow
Gray
Dark Gray
Blue
Green
Cyan
Red
Magenta
Yellow
White
Black
Dark Blue
Dark Green
Dark Cyan
Dark Red
Dark Magenta
Dark Yellow
Gray
Dark Gray
Blue
Green
Cyan
Red
Magenta
Yellow
White
COLOR
Sets
the default console foreground and background colors.
Syntax
COLOR[background]
[foreground]
Color
attributes are specified by 2 of the following hex digits. Each digit can be of
the following value:
0 = Black
8 = Gray
1 = Blue
9
= Light Green
2 = Green
A = Light Green
3 = Aqua
B
= Light Aqua
4
= Red
C
= Light Red
5
= Purple
D
= Light Purple
6 = Yellow
E = Light Yellow
7 = White
F
= Bright White
If
no argument is given, COLOR restores the color to what it was when CMD.EXE
started.
Color
values are assigned in the following order:
The
Default color registry value.
The
CMD / T command sets ERROR LEVEL to 1 if an attempt is to execute the COLOR
command with a foreground and background color that are the same.
Color 17
Color 9f
Color 0f
Color 07
|
COLOR
07, white on black is the default.
COLOR 00 is
an invalid option and will set % ERRORLEVEL% to 1
The
COLOR command will change the color of
all the text in the window.
COLOR
is an internal command.
“
How much more black could this be? “and
the answer is “None ….none more black”~
Spinal Tap.S
Related:
CMD
– Start a new CMD shell
EXIT
– Set a specific error level
Power
Shell: Write- Host – Write output to the screen ( color can be set for
individual strings ).
Color
codes -
HTML/ CSS
Aaron
Margolis – change prompt colors for all Admin level prompts
Color
Scheme Designer – Design color themes
Equivalent
bash command ( Linux): discolors – Color setup for “Is.
CHAPTER
THREE
FILES AND DIRECTORIES IN MS DOS
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
Some
students are saying that Microsoft disk operating system is one of the hardest
and confusing package but I will like to put this impression in them that MS-
DOS is an interesting package that one should know and boost of, because there
is this external command which if you known how to make use of it if people
will be running to you for help.
PROBLEMS AND LIMITATIONS
It
was not an easy something for me come to the end of this project due to some
certain problem, but thanks be to God
Almighty who made it possible for me to come to the end of it.
Due
to insufficient time given everything has to be rushed in order to submit on
time.
So
I am now saying that enough space should be given so that students should
browse properly and type very well like one month+.
REFERENCE
·
Cyberworld handout
·
Vera computer handout
·
Internet browsing
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